The only people who will be angry at you for speaking the truth based on real facts are ‎those who perpetuate a life of denial and deceit. Like a ray of sunshine through a crack ‎into a room filled with ignorance and fear, truth seeks out those who are righteous.‎ Y. M.

Friday, March 28, 2014

Recently Secretary of State John Kerry had stated that he
welcomed the "positive steps" in Israel's
negotiations with the "Falestians" proposed by the "Arab
League", that illustrious body which is hardly a model for peaceful
settlement of disputes in the spirit of the United Nations. Evidently the
Secretary of State skipped his history classes in University to demonstrate
against his fellow Viet Nam
veterans and had not learned this.

Following the adoption of the Alexandria Protocol in 1944 by five Arab states: Egypt, Trans-Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, the Arab League was formed in Cairo on 22 March 1945. It originally comprised five members Yemen only joined as a member on 5 May 1945.

Since the establishment of the Arab League in 1945, it has led
the way for the outpouring of Arab hatred and displeasure at the hands of the
Imperialistic Colonial powers for the establishment of a Jewish Homeland in “ArabLand”. The members of the Arab
League have constantly voiced their anti-Zionist feelings since its creation.

Here are the major points:

December 1945 - The Arab League launched a boycott of 'Zionist goods'

June 1946 - The Arab League established the Higher Arab Committee a radical
body that led and coordinated attempts to wipe Israel
off the map.

December 1946 - The Arab League rejected the first proposed Palestine
partition plans.

October 1947 - The Arab League reasserted the necessity for military
preparations along Arab borders for "defending Palestine."

February 1948 - The Arab League approved "a plan for political,
military, and economic measures to be taken in response to the Palestine
crisis."

October 1948 - The Arab League rejected outright Resolution 181, the UN
"Partition Plan" for Palestine.

May 15 1948 - The members of the Arab League; Egypt,
Trans-Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and contingents from Saudi Arabia and Yemen
were "compelled to intervene" to "restore law and order” invaded
and occupied the Mandated Areas. This step is outlined in its "Declaration
on the Invasion of Palestine."

"The injustice implied in this solution [affecting] the
right of the people of Palestine to immediate independence ... declared the
Arabs' rejection of [Resolution 181]" which the League said "would
not be possible to carry it out by peaceful means, and that its forcible
imposition would constitute a threat to peace and security in this area"
and claimed that the "security and order in Palestine have become
disrupted" due to the "aggressive intentions, and the imperialistic
designs of the Zionists" and "the Governments of the Arab States, as
members of the Arab League, a regional organization ... view the events taking
place in Palestine as a threat to peace and security in the area as a whole.
... Therefore, as security in Palestine
is a sacred trust in the hands of the Arab States, and in order to put an end
to this state of affairs ... the Governments of the Arab States have found
themselves compelled to intervene in Palestine."

July 15 1948
- UN Security Council Resolution 54 called on Arab aggression to stop.
"The members of the Arab League have rejected successive appeals of the
United Nations Mediator, and of the Security Council in its resolution 53
(1948) of 7 July 1948, for the prolongation of the truce in Palestine; and that
there has consequently developed a renewal of hostilities in Palestine."

October 1949 - The Arab League declared that negotiation
with Israel by
any Arab state would be in violation of Article 18 of the Arab League.

April 1950 - The Arab League called for severance of
relations with any Arab state which engaged in relations or contacts with Israel
and prohibited Member states from negotiating unilateral peace with Israel.

March 1979 - The Arab League suspended Egypt's
membership in the League (retroactively) from the date of its signing a peace
treaty with Israel.

March 27-28, 2002
- At the height of Palestinian suicide attacks in Israel
the Arab League adopted the "Beirut Declaration"

"We, the kings, presidents, and emirs of the Arab
states meeting in the Council of the Arab League Summit in Beirut, capital of
Lebanon ... have conducted a thorough assessment of the developments and
challenges ... relating to the Arab region and, more specifically, to the
occupied Palestinian territory. With great pride, we followed the Palestinian
people's Intifada and valiant resistance. ... We address a greeting of pride
and honor to the Palestinian people's steadfastness and valiant Intifada
against the Israeli occupation and its destructive war machine. We greet with
honor and pride the valiant martyrs of the Intifada."

Where is "Peace" mentioned?
At this same Beirut Summit on 28 March 2002, the Arab League adopted the Arab Peace Initiative, a Saudi-inspired peace plan for the Arab–Israeli conflict. The initiative offered full normalization of the relations with Israel. In return for this the Arab League demands that Israel:

withdraw from all occupied territories, including the Golan Heights

recognize Palestinian independence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital.

provide a "just solution" for the Palestinian refugees.

No mention of their accepting Israel as the "Jewish State" and no mention of the Jewish refugees from Arab lands and their "Just Solution".

Saturday, March 22, 2014

Who
was this person Michaelis de Nostredame? Interest in Nostradamus has not died
out through the ages was he real where his predictions actually made? His name
reached many young people through the song of the Scottish balladeer Al Stewart
that was released in 1973. So what is the meaning of the name
"Nostradamus," the name chosen by ‎the famous
astrologer? Could it have some special hidden meaning? Was he as a secret Jew?
Had he been a descendant of the Israelite tribe of Issachar and a follower of
the Zohar and Kabbalah taught to him by his grandfather Jean de St. Rémy?

It
is recorded that Jaume's father, the Jewish apothecary Guy Gassonet, had
converted to Catholicism around 1455 (?), taking the Christian name
"Pierre" and the surname "Nostredame" comprised of two
parts; the Latin word; Nostrum -which means in part ‎‎"a
medicine whose ingredients are kept secret", and the French words N‎otre Dame or "Our Lady", a reference to Mary the
"virgin mother ‎of Jesus".

This
fact is interesting since many "New Christians" converted to ‎Catholicism during this bleak period of European history before
the Spanish Inquisition in 1492. Many ‎of these Medieval
European Jews continued to remain “secret Jews” or “Marranous." They were
so secretive out of fear so as to prevent their discovery otherwise they would
be tortured and burned to death at the stake for heresy. Nostradamus's family
may have been one of those Jewish families that ‎‎feared
the "Inquisitor" and hid their Judaism. The hint of this can be found
in the story surrounding his maternal great-grandfather Jean de St. Rémy since
there is a persistent tradition that he was educated by him. However he
“suddenly” disappears from the historical records after 1504.

Michel
de Nostredame was one of at least nine children of Reynière (or Renée) de
Saint-Rémy and Jaume (or Jacques) de Nostredame a grain dealer and notary.
Michel's known siblings included Delphine, Jean I (c. 1507–77), Pierre, Hector,
Louis, Bertrand, Jean II (born 1522) and Antoine (born 1523).

‎

Nostradamus
father had been a noted astrologer and apothecary - physician. So ‎when Nostradamus was a young boy his father taught him
astronomy, ‎astrology and apothecary / medicine. The young
Nostradamus was enrolled at the ‎school of Medicine at Montpellier. While still a student
at the academy ‎Nostradamus became well known for his
knowledge of astronomy. His ‎knowledge almost cost him his
life when he advanced the theory that the ‎earth revolves
around the sun. To many this was a "heretical" thought ‎because
it went against the teachings of the church.

Nostradamus
entered the University of Avignon at the age of 15 to
study for his baccalaureate. After little more than a year he was forced to
leave Avignon when the university
closed its doors in the face of an outbreak of the plague. After leaving Avignon, Nostradamus traveled
the countryside for eight years from 1521 researching herbal remedies. In 1529,
after some years as an apothecary, he entered the University of Montpellier to study for a doctorate
in medicine. He was expelled shortly afterwards by the university's procurator,
Guillaume Rondelet, when it was discovered that he had been an apothecary, a
"manual trade" expressly banned by the university statutes, and had
been slandering doctors. The expulsion document still exists in the faculty
library.

Because
‎of his knowledge he was hired by the French King Francis
I, ‎of Angouleme, the House of Valois to be the personal
physician to ‎his oldest son the Dauphin Henry (1519-1559)
the heir to the ‎French throne.‎ During
the years 1535-1545 an epidemic know as the ‎‎"Bubonic
Plague" reappeared in Europe. As a physician,
Nostradamus fame ‎grew with his cures the "rose
pill" that supposedly protected against the plague and ‎his
prescribed treatment for the "Bubonic Plague" were based on rules of
cleanliness ‎and hygiene outlined in the Bible and by the
writings of the Mosheh ben Maimon (משה בן מימון),
called Moses Maimonides or RAMBAM Hebrew acronym for "Rabbeinu Mosheh Ben
Maimon" – English translation: "Our Rabbi/Teacher Moses Son [of]
Maimon". Yet despite all of ‎Nostradamus's medical
knowledge his first wife Henriette d'Encausse and two daughters became infected
‎by the disease and died of the plague.

‎

After
the death of his wife and daughters, around the year ‎‎1545,
he became embittered and lonely. He took to traveling until ‎he
decided to remarry in 1548. He isolated himself in a tower of ‎a
castle that belonged to King Henry the second in Saint Lo near ‎a
village in the south of France. Nostradamus turned to
the study ‎of astrology and the "occult"(?). It
is here that he has his ‎first visions of future events.‎

Nostradamus
published his book of predictions "The Cent‎uries"
in 1555. The book was called the centuries because it was ‎divided
into ten parts, each of the 100 four line verses, stretching ‎from
the date of publication (1555) to an indefinite time in ‎the
future. Many first editions exist today, so there is no doubt ‎as
to the authenticity of the text.

Many
of Nostradamus's ‎"predictions” have come true and
here are but a few examples:

‎"The blood of the
just will be demanded of London, burnt through fire in the year three times
twenty and six”‎

Indeed
in the year 1666 the city of London suffered from a
disastrous ‎fire known in English history as the great
fire of London.‎"

"The
English Parliament will put it's King to death."

Charles
I King of England was beheaded by order of Parliament ‎and
Cromwell on January 30, 1649.‎

‎

‎"An Emperor of
France shall be born on an island near Italy, his rule will cost his Empire
dear, Nay Pol Loron will be more of fire than blood"

Napoleon
was born on the island of Corsica near Italy.‎

“Hister,
the German of the Crooked Cross, The Captain of Greater Germaine, no law does
this man observe. Bloody his rise and fall shall be.”

‎There is no doubt
that Nostradamus is alluding to Adolph
Hitler.‎

"In
the new lands of America, three brothers now
shall come to power. Two men are born to rule, but all must die before their
hour."

‎This is a reference to
Joseph, John and Robert Kennedy.‎

A
great wall that divides a city at this time is cast aside.

Is
this the Berlin wall November 1990‎?

‎

Nostradamus
is a reputed seer whose published collection of prophecies have become famous
worldwide. He is best known for his book "Les Propheties", the first
edition of which appeared in 1555. Since the publication of this book, it has
rarely been out of print since his death, Nostradamus quatrains have
purportedly predicted many major world events and because of this he has a wide
following. He is best known for his book "Les Propheties", the first
edition of which appeared in 1555. Since the publication of this book, it has
rarely been out of print since his death.

According
to the famous English diarist Samuel Pepys, as early as 1667, long before the
French Revolution. Pepys records in his celebrated diary s to his prophecies
there is a legend that, before his death, Nostradamus made the townsfolk swear
that his grave would never be disturbed; but when dug up at the French
Revolution, 60 years later a brass plaque was found on his chest correctly
stating the date and time when his grave would be opened and cursing the
exhumers.

Nostradamus's
tombstone, in the Collegiale St-Laurent, at Salon-de-Provence Bouches-du-Rhône, France. As noted on his crypt
Nostrad‎amus- Micha Ben Elias or Michaelis de ‎Notredame was born in Saint Reims de ‎la Provence, France on 14th or 21st of
December 1503 and died on the 2nd July 1566.‎

The
headstone, written in Latin and composed by his wife, reads as follows:
"Here lie the bones of the illustrious Michel Nostradamus, alone of all
mortals judged worthy to record events of the entire world with his almost
divine pen, under the influence of the stars. He lived 62 years, 6 months, and
17 days. He died at Salon in the year 1566. Let not prosperity disturb his rest.
Anne Pons Gemelle wishes her husband true happiness."

As I was reading this supposed "enlightened" UN BS
artist’s article by Ynet and as per usual UN representatives like Falk do not
check into fact before spread the lies of the “Falestinians”. Let us review his
statement Falk said "that more than 11,000 Palestinians had lost their
right to live in Jerusalem since
1996 due to Israel
imposing residency laws favoring Jews and revoking Palestinian residence
permits." And that Israel
is practicing “Ethnic Cleansing” So what are the real facts?

View of the two large Synagogues in the Old City prior to their destruction by the Jordanians in 1948

Arab respect for the Jewish Synagogue Tiferet Yisrael in 1948

Hmm first of all Mr Falk before spreading lies one should
know facts. As to “Ethnic Cleansing” I would love to have the answer to the
question; “Where was the UN when the Jewish Quarter of the OldCity and the Jews from the
settlements of the Gush Etzion Block who were ethnically cleansed by the
invading Jordanians in 1948?? Also where was the UN during the entire illegal Jordanian
Occupation of the “West Bank” from 1947- 1967?

Ethnic Cleansing of Jews from Jerusalem and Gush Etzion

It is a recorded fact that between 100,000 to 200,000 of the
Arabs of the Mandated Area moved to the Mandated Area in the years of
prosperity during the British Mandate. What is not mentioned, is that most of them
were not land owners but only those renting or leasing of homes. Property
disputes have always existed, especially since the first land registration
-Tabu - law was promulgated from the days of the Turks in 1858. It is a historical
and documented fact that most of those Arab inhabitants do not have actual ownership
/ title to the land they claim is theirs.

“A few months after my family and I moved to Shiloh
in 1981, I witnessed a
microcosm of the land problem between Jews and Arabs. A
section of land was
to be put aside for security purposes and, as the legal
procedure dictated,
the mukhtars of nearby villages were informed and asked to
make sure that
any resident claiming private ownership rights should show
up on a certain
day to stake his claim.

Sure enough, at the appointed hour, seven Arabs walked onto
the area and
then were asked to stand on what each claimed as his private
plot. Within
minutes a difficult situation developed when two villagers
stood on the same
fertile section, insisting that each owned it. A minute
later and they were
throwing stones at each other.

We, the residents of Shiloh, the IDF
officers and legal officials all stood
around amazed. In the end, with no documents, no tax
receipts, no maps nor
any other reliable proof of ownership, the land was
confirmed as "state
land" and assigned to its new use.” Yisrael Medad, THE JERUSALEM
POST Nov. 22, 2006

The Turks and later the British attempted to register land
ownership -by census - but only those who paid taxes could get ownership.
Therefore many Arab inhabitants hid or lied to not have to pay taxes and
thereby did not admit to ownership. Many -whole primarily Moslem -villages were
virtual "serfs" or indentured servants to wealthy absentee land
owners residing in Beirut or Damascus.
And it is well known that most Arabs of the area immigrated to the Mandatory
Areas after the Liberation in 1918 and establishment of the Mandate. So in
essence they are squatters and as in most civilized countries of the world you
cannot stay on land that is not legally yours.

Jews had purchased 6 to 8 percent of the total land area of Palestine.
This was about 20% of the land that could be settled and cultivated. About 46%
of the land was registered in the tax registers to Arab villages, to Arabs
living on the land, or absentee owners, and about the same amount was
government land. However, most of this land was not privately owned. The Arabs
of Palestine had received much of their land in leases conditional upon
cultivation or used land that was part of village commons.

During the Turkish census according to Beinin and Hajjar
there was no administrative district of Palestine. Turkish census figures were
for various districts, including the Jerusalem,
Acco and Nablus districts for
example. The Acre district included areas in Lebanon,
outside the modern borders of Palestine
in which there were no Jews. So the figure for the Turkish census for 1878
which listed 462,465 Turkish subjects in the Jerusalem,
Nablus and Acre
districts: 403,795 Muslims (including Druze), 43,659 Christians and 15,011
Jews. Simply cannot represent the population of the Arabs of the Mandated
areas.Prior to the British conquest in 1917 of the city of Jerusalem
it had a Jewish majority of 70%. since about 1896 - The city of Jerusalem
itself there was a Jewish majority since about 1896, but probably not before.
The district of Jerusalem (as opposed to the city) comprised a very wide area
in Ottoman and British times, in which there was a Muslim majority. This
included Jericho, Bethlehem
and other towns. Within the Jerusalem
district, there was a sub district of Jerusalem that includes many of the
immediate suburbs such as Ein Karem, Beit Zeit etc. In that sub district, the
Jews remained a minority, with only about 52,000 out of 132,000 persons in 1931
for example.

Population of Jerusalem
until 1945

Year

Total

Muslim

Jewish

Christian

% Jews

1841

15,510

5,000

7,120

3,390

45.9

1876

25,030

7,560

12,000

5,470

47.9

1896

45,420

8,560

28,112

8,748

61.9

1922

52,081

13,411

33,971

4,699

65.2

1931

90,451

19,894

51,222

19,335

56.6

1945

164,330

33,680

99,320

31,330

60.4

1. This figure is quoted widely on the Web and is apparently
the Ottoman census figure. It is given for example here.

There are those who place the population of the Arabs of the
“Mandated Area” in 1893 before the arrival of the waves of Zionist Aliyah at 410,000
Arab Muslims and Christians in Palestine because both Arabs and Jews avoided
the Turkish census. Foreigners who were without residence permits did not want
to make their presence known. Arabs wished avoid taxes and in the 19th century,
only Muslims were subject to the draft, and accordingly, Muslims tended to
avoid the census. The British carried out only two censuses - in 1922 and 1931.
The Bluebook figures were apparently last compiled in 1945 and reflect figures
from 1944 or 1945. The Report of the Anglo American Committee of Inquiry used
those figures and others to estimate the population of Palestine
at the end of 1946, by projecting birth rates apparently. Between 1946 and the
announcement of partition in November 1947, there was significant emigration of
Arabs from Palestine.

After the creation of the British Mandate for Palestine,
the Jewish population increased due to immigration, especially in the 1930s. The
population of the Arabs of the “Mandated Area” also increased at an exceptional
rate. When there were more or less reliable records we can see that about
18,000 non-Jews entered Palestine
between 1930 and 1939 while in the same period, about 5,000 non-Jews left. This
does not count illegal immigration of course, or immigration prior to
1930. Economic analyses show that by the
1930s the standard of living of Arabs of the “Mandated Area” was approximately
twice that of Arabs in surrounding countries, whereas in Ottoman Turkish times
it was lower than in surrounding countries.

Some of the farm population may have suffered economic
hardship, characteristic of any industrializing and urbanizing society, but in
the main, the standard of living improved, and it improved much faster than it
did in surrounding countries. There is no doubt that this improvement in
conditions was an attractant for immigrants as well as resulting in improved
health and larger families. Additionally, British activity in building the port
of Haifa during the 1920s and in
operating it during WW II undoubtedly attracted new Arab workers from outside
of the Mandate. However, there is no hard evidence to show that the actual
figure of the Arabs of the “Mandated Area” prior to 1948 numbered between 700,000
to 800,000. It is impossible to determine the exact number since economic
conditions did not improve until mandatory times, it is unlikely that the bulk
of the immigration occurred under Turkish administration.

"The area was under populated and remained economically
stagnant until the arrival of the first Zionist pioneers in the 1880's, who
came to rebuild the Jewish land. The country had remained "The Holy
Land" in the religious and historic consciousness of mankind, which
associated it with the Bible and the history of the Jewish people. Jewish
development of the country also attracted large numbers of other immigrants -
both Jewish and Arab. - The report of the British Royal Commission, 1913

Jewish Yemenite migration to the Land of Israel took place in 1881-1882 when a group of Jews of Yemen arrived by foot to Jerusalem. They belonged to no "Zionist movement." They returned out of an age-old religious fervor to return to Zion. The new immigrants settled on Jewish-owned property in the Shiloah Village outside of the Old City walls of Jerusalem. The Jews of Shiloah were the targets of anti-Jewish pogroms during the anti-Jewish riots in 1921 and again during the 1936-39 Arab revolt when they were evacuated by the British authorities. These Jewish families returned to Silwan/Shiloah after Israel reunited the city of Jerusalem in 1967 to reclaim the Jewish-owned property.

Shiloah/Silwan Today

Joan Peters, in her book "From Time Immemorial,"
argues that most of the increase in Arab population was in fact due to illegal
Arab immigration. Her figures are not accepted by most demographers and
historians, including Zionists. Norman Finkelstein and others have criticized
her thesis and shown evidence of poor scholarship. Finkelstein's analysis also
shows that the largest increases of Palestinian Arab population occurred close
to Jewish population centers in Palestine,
which would argue against the Palestinian contention that the Zionists were
dispossessing Arabs. We do not know if this increase was due to population
shifts in Palestine or immigration
from outside Palestine. It is certain that there was at least some
illegal Palestinian-Arab immigration, as noted in British mandatory reports.
Immigration from Transjordan was not illegal, and was
not recorded as immigration at all until 1938. Beginning in the 1920s when they
built Haifa port, and especially
during and just prior to World War II,
the British recruited Arab workers from the Houran in Syria
and elsewhere. Arabs also came to Palestine
before the war, attracted by higher wages. However, since much of the depletion
of Palestinian population that had occurred in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries was due to migration to neighboring countries, many of these
returning Arabs may have been families returning to Palestine.

Falk and his bosses at the UN ignore the historical fact and
International Law that the "West Bank" territory,
was part of the "Mandated Area" given to the British to control in
1919. This area was offered to and refused by the "Arabs of the Mandated
Areas" in the partition plan of 1948 that opted for open combat in
defiance of the Partition Agreement of the UN. This disputed area refused by
the "Arabs of the Mandated Areas" was illegally captured by the
"Trans-Jordanian" Army in 1948 and occupied by the Hashemite Kingdom
of Jordan until their defeat in 1967. With the establishment of the border,
between Israel
and Jordan in
the negotiated 1995 peace accords, the "West Bank"
officially became Israeli territory as per Der Jure International Law.

Justice Stephen M. Schwebel, who spent 19 years as a judge
of the International Court of Justice at The Hague
including three years as President. explained; "...modifications of the
1949 armistice lines among those States within former Palestinian territory are
lawful (if not necessarily desirable), whether those modifications are, in
Secretary Rogers's words, "insubstantial alterations required for mutual
security" or more substantial alterations - such as recognition of Israeli
sovereignty over the whole of Jerusalem.." and in a footnote he added
"It should be added that the armistice agreements of 1949 expressly preserved
the territorial claims of all parties and did not purport to establish
definitive boundaries between them". Therefore the 1949 Armistice lines are
not fixed, as purported by the Palestinians and their supporters.

In fact in 1948 The Jordanian Government Army invaded the PalestinianMandatedTerritory
and at the end of the fighting illegally annexed the “West Bank”
and East Jerusalem, a move which was recognized only by Britain
and Pakistan. In
terms of international law, between 1948 and 1967 the entire area of what remained of the Palestinian Mandated Territory in the
“West Bank” was terra nullius, or "land belonging to no
one" over which sovereignty may be acquired through occupation. The
concept of terra nullius is well recognized in international law. Therefore the
“Palestinians” never had sovereignty over the “West Bank”
or East Jerusalem. Justice Schwebel concluded that
since Jordan,
the prior occupying power of the “West Bank” and East
Jerusalem had seized that territory unlawfully in 1948; Israel
which subsequently took that territory in the lawful exercise of self-defense
in 1967 has better title to it.

With the negotiated peace treaty between Jordan and Israel
in 1995 the "Mandated Area" for the Jewish Homeland (Article 8
Mandate for Palestine) was returned and therefore the "West Bank"
officially became Israeli territory as per International Law termed; Uti
possidetis juris or uti possidetis iuris (Latin for "as you possess under
law") is a principle of international law that states that newly formed
sovereign states should have the same borders that their preceding dependent
area had before their independence. So legally there is no need to annex since
neither the Jordanians nor the "Falestinians" never claimed sovereignty according
to International Law. Thereby reinforcing Justice Schwebel's claim of “terra nullius”, or "land belonging to no one".

In fact during negotiations for the 1995 peace agreement signed between Israel
and Jordan, the
Jordanian government made no claim to it. And as East Jerusalem
came into Israel's
possession in the course of a defensive war, Israel
was entitled to annex it and create a united Jerusalem.
Consequently, the Jerusalem City Council has jurisdiction over building
approvals for Jewish and Arab resident in any part of the city.

Thursday, March 20, 2014

HaRav Shmuel Yitzhak Churgin, son of HaRav Eliahu Ben Haim Churgin, was born in 1865 in Karlin near Pinsk, Belarus, in the Polesia region of Russia. He was from a family of rabbis, biblical schloars- Torah and lovers of Zion. He was educated in the Cheder (alternatively, Cheider, in Hebrew חדר, meaning "room") which is a traditional elementary school teaching the basics of religious Judaism and the Hebrew language Shumel excelled in his studies. He had a love for the Torah and the Halachic rulings, Halakha (Hebrew: הֲלָכָה) also transliterated Halocho (Ashkenazic), the collective body of Jewish religious laws, based on the Written and Oral Torah, including the 613 mitzvot and later Talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions compiled today in the Shulchan Aruch, "the Code of Jewish Law." It was this great love for the Torah - the Bible, that he later taught to thousands of students at " Gates of Torah" and Mikveh Israel (Hebrew: מִקְוֵה יִשְׂרָאֵל; "Hope of Israel") the first Jewish agricultural school in Israel

At the age of twenty, in 1885. he married Chasiyah Eisenberg (Daughter of Aaron Eisenberg). A few years after his marriage in 1889, he was offered the opportunity to immigrate to America to study at a university there. HaRav Churgin and many young Jews had been affected by the wave of pogroms of 1881–1884 and anti-Semitic May Laws of 1882 introduced by Tsar Alexander III of Russia. These incidents of ant-Semitic hatred prompted mass emigration of Jews from the Russian Empire. HaRav Churgin decided to join with many other inspired young Jews to heed the call of the Lover's of Zion and to make Aliyah to Eretz Yisrael and to assist the rebuilding of the Jewish Homeland in the backward desolate portion of the dying Turkish Empire. So he became a Pioneer or Bilu (Hebrew: ביל"ו which is an acronym based on a verse from the Book of Isaiah (2:5) "בית יעקב לכו ונלכה" Beit Ya'akov Lekhu Venelkha ("House of Jacob, let us go [up]")) The Bilu'im were part of a movement whose goal was the agricultural resettlement of Eretz Yisrael - the Land of Israel.

Jewish settlers ("Biluim") in Palestine, 1880's

In 1889 he made Aliyah - immigrated to Israel. He went through some very exasperating experiences upon his arrival. as did many new comers in the early days of the First Aliyah to Eretz Yisrael. At that time the area was a sleepy backwater of the dying Ottoman Turkish Empire. Sparsely populated and filled with marauding bands of Arab Bedouin thieves. The land was treeless and barren. It was filled with rocky spaces and mosquito filled swamps with deadly malaria.

"Of all the lands there are for dismal scenery, I think Palestine must be the prince. The hills are barren, they are dull of color, they are unpicturesque in shape. The valleys are unsightly deserts fringed with a feeble vegetation that has an expression about it of being sorrowful and despondent. The Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee sleep in the midst of a vast stretch of hill and plain wherein the eye rests upon no pleasant tint, no striking object, no soft picture dreaming in a purple haze or mottled with the shadows of the clouds. Every outline is harsh, every feature is distinct, there is no perspective--distance works no enchantment here. It is a hopeless, dreary, heart-broken land.Small shreds and patches of it must be very beautiful in the full flush of spring, however, and all the more beautiful by contrast with the far-reaching desolation that surrounds them on every side. I would like much to see the fringes of the Jordan in spring-time, and Shechem, Esdraelon, Ajalon and the borders of Galilee--but even then these spots would seem mere toy gardens set at wide intervals in the waste of a limitless desolation.Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes. Over it broods the spell of a curse that has withered its fields and fettered its energies. Where Sodom and Gomorrah reared their domes and towers, that solemn sea now floods the plain, in whose bitter waters no living thing exists--over whose waveless surface the blistering air hangs motionless and dead-- about whose borders nothing grows but weeds, and scattering tufts of cane, and that treacherous fruit that promises refreshment to parching lips, but turns to ashes at the touch. Nazareth is forlorn; about that ford of Jordan where the hosts of Israel entered the Promised Land with songs of rejoicing, one finds only a squalid camp of fantastic Bedouins of the desert; Jericho the accursed, lies a moldering ruin, to-day, even as Joshua's miracle left it more than three thousand years ago; Bethlehem and Bethany, in their poverty and their humiliation, have nothing about them now to remind one that they once knew the high honor of the Saviour's presence; the hallowed spot where the shepherds watched their flocks by night, and where the angels sang Peace on earth, good will to men, is untenanted by any living creature, and unblessed by any feature that is pleasant to the eye. .... The noted Sea of Galilee, where Roman fleets once rode at anchor and the disciples of the Saviour sailed in their ships, was long ago deserted by the devotees of war and commerce, and its borders are a silent wilderness; Capernaum is a shapeless ruin; Magdala is the home of beggared Arabs; Bethsaida and Chorazin have vanished from the earth, and the "desert places" round about them where thousands of men once listened to the Saviour's voice and ate the miraculous bread, sleep in the hush of a solitude that is inhabited only by birds of prey and skulking foxes." A section from Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad On the land of Palestine

The Jewish community in the ancient seaside port city of Jaffa was very small. It was located within the Arab Old City. From here every day at the crack of dawn he would walk the 25 kilometers to the new Jewish town of Rehovot. It was here in this newly founded colony/settlement he would work alongside other new immigrants. As the evening drew near he would walk back to Yaffo and with the dawn he would return once again to go to work. The work was physical, hard and long but he and the other young Zionists enjoyed the work. They knew that they were rebuilding the Jewish Homeland.

Rechovot 1912

After a few short years he was able to bring Chassiyah and their three children to be with him in Eretz Yisrael. They lived in Jaffa, since the new Jewish City of Tel Aviv had not yet been founded. There were no living quaters available so they rented in the old city of Jaff/Yaffo. Because of this the Jewish women were forced to go out veiled dressed in burqas (an enveloping outer garment worn by Moslem women to cover their bodies) whenever they ventured into the streets out of fear of attack from their Arab neighbors.

HaRav Churgin who had once dreamed of becoming a farmer settling in one of the agricultural settlements, was forced to abandon his dream due to financial considerations and the severity of life in the Yishuv. To feed his family he returned with fervor to his first love as a teacher in the Talmud Torah -"Sharei Torah" or "Gates of Torah". "Sharei Torah" had just been founded and it was the only institution of it's kind for Jewish children in Jaffa. He remained a teacher there for decades eventually moving with them to it's new quarters in Neve Shalom. Thousands of students learned from him his passion for the Halachic rulings and especially the Torah / Bible. He was able to also inspire in them his love and passion for Torah as well as for the Land of Israel.

In my research I found that it was a high probability that when HaRav Kook moved to Ottoman Palestine in 1904 to assume the rabbinical post in Jaffa, which also included responsibility for the new mostly secular Zionist agricultural settlements nearby. He may have been in contact with HaRav Churgin since they both shared a love for Halacha and the rebirth of Jewish life in Eretz Yisrael. As a respected teacher he may have influenced HaRav Kook as he engaged in kiruv ("Jewish outreach"), creating a greater role for Torah and Halakha in the life of the city and the nearby settlements.

Talmud Torah Sharei Torah 1912 -1938

What is notable of HaRav Churgin is that he had been educated in the writing style of the ancient Hebrew writers. So in his leisure time he began writing poems in the long forgotten oratorical style of the ancient Jewish writers. He soon became recognized throughout the reborn Jewish settlement in Eretz Yisrael as a famous scholar in the rebirth of the Hebrew language and grammar. Dozens of private students from the best houses in the new Jewish city of Tel Aviv flocked to take lessons from him in the reborn language of modern Hebrew. These students -as well as his son Yakov later formed the original core group of new Hebrew speakers and writers.

Despite all the hardships of eking out a living and having a large family. HaRav Churgin was able to participate in public affairs in the Yishuv. As the years moved on and his health began to fail him only than did he stop his love of writing and teaching but not before leaving his contribution to the re-establishment of the Jewish home land in Eretz Yisrael and his love for Torah and Zionism was passed on.

I include below a picture of the daughter of HaRav Shmuel Yitzhak Churgin and Chasiyah Eisenberg (Daughter of Aaron Eisenberg) Rachel Churgin the wife of David Blick and their daughter Esther Blick -wife of Chaim Brownstein grandmother of my wife Rena.

Monday, March 17, 2014

‎With the rise of Nazi Germany during the years 1933 -1938 the Nazi regime free ‎immigration of the Jews of Europe was of the utmost issue for Jewish circles. The critical ‎period of 1938-1941 was the period of the beginnings of war in Europe. It was also the ‎period of British appeasement to the Arabs of the severe restrictions of Jewish ‎immigration in the White Paper of 1939.‎

President Roosevelt's interest in transferring Arabs from Palestine began in ‎‎October 1938 after a meeting with Justice Louis Brandeis. ‎‎Brandeis reported on this meeting to Felix Frankfurter who in turn passed on the report to ‎‎Stephen Wise and to presidential adviser and script-writer Ben Cohen. Brandeis pointed ‎out in his report of this meeting how Roosevelt appreciated the ‎significance of Palestine, ‎‎“the need of keeping it whole and of making it Jewish". He was ‎tremendously interested - ‎and wholly surprised - on learning of the great increase in Arab ‎population since the First ‎World War; and on learning of the plenitude of land for Arabs in Arab ‎countries, about ‎which he made specific inquiries.”‎

The Historian Zaha Bustami commented that it was, “…difficult to tell who brought up ‎‎this subject during the meeting, but the information on Arab demography was provided ‎‎by Frankfurter.” Who had met with FDR a few days earlier a meeting to discuss the ‎‎Palestine situation; however there are no records of what Roosevelt said at this meeting. ‎

On 25th of October 1938, Roosevelt had a meeting with the British Ambassador to the ‎‎U.S. Sir Ronald Lindsay. Lindsay wrote that the President was “impressed by the fact ‎‎that the Arab population had increased by 400,000 since the establishment of the [League ‎‎Of Nations] Mandate.” ‎

FDR also contemplated the creation of a program of well-digging ‎across the Jordan. ‎Roosevelt firmly believed that, “we ought to be able to find that money ‎for the purpose”. ‎FDR believed that once a large quantity of water would be made ‎available for irrigation ‎and the cultivable land thus created in Trans-Jordanian territory it;

‎‎“should be set apart ‎for Arabs from Palestine. They should be offered land free, and that ‎ought to be enough ‎to attract them; and failing the attraction, they should be compelled to ‎emigrate to it. ‎Palestine could thus be relieved of 200,000 Arabs”.‎

‎FDR also added that it would “be necessary to prescribe that no Arab should be ‎allowed ‎to immigrate into Palestine, and no Jew into the Arab lands.” ‎‎

The Assistant Secretary of State Adolf Berle, later recalled that,” The President was full ‎‎of Palestine” and that FDR called on Ronald Lindsay to call a conference of Arab ‎‎princes. FDR was adamant in having them lay down; “say ‎‎$200,000,000 buying a farm ‎for every Arab who wishes to leave Palestine, the money ‎chiefly to be used in digging ‎wells, which is perfectly possible in the Hedjaz.” Here, it is ‎quite clear that Roosevelt‎intended the Arabs to "foot the bill" for the transfer of the Arabs of ‎Palestine.‎

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British Ambassador Lindsay therefore asked Lancelot Oliphant of the British Foreign ‎‎Office to have someone prepare a “short answer to this scheme” to have in readiness, ‎‎although he stressed that he would not take the initiative in sending a reply to the ‎‎President. Lindsay’s request was first dealt with by Lacy Baggalay of the Foreign Office. ‎He first ‎quoted experts, who held that the possibilities of finding water in quantity by ‎boring in ‎Transjordan were, “quite restricted”. He then continued, “But even assuming ‎that water ‎could be found in large quantities, it is now out of the question that any Arabs ‎should be ‎‎'compelled' to emigrate to the lands thus brought into cultivation.

"Whatever ‎else may ‎remain uncertain about the problem of Palestine, the impossibility of ‎compulsion on this ‎scale is now beyond dispute."‎

There are those who blame the genesis of Roosevelt's idea of a forcible or voluntary ‎eviction of Palestinian Arabs ‎to Trans-Jordan or other neighboring lands on Roosevelt’s ‎contacts with Zionist circles in the summer of 1938 perhaps in discussions with Brandeis ‎and ‎Frankfurter.

So "Who" actually had given Roosevelt the idea that irrigation of the Transjordan desert would create a ‎‎suitable location for the Arab transferees? The indications are that it came from the State ‎‎Department where at that period Edward Norman was in contact with government ‎‎officials to advance his own transfer plans. Although Norman was at the time in contact ‎‎with the State Department, his plans were in fact to irrigate Iraq by means of the dams it ‎‎had recently constructed.‎‎ ‎

Roosevelt summoned Lindsay for a further meeting, presumably during the first half of ‎‎November. At this meeting, the President said that he thought that “the British should call ‎‎in some of the Arab leaders from Palestine and some of the leaders from the adjoining ‎‎Arab countries.”‎

"The British should explain to them that they, the Arabs, had within their ‎‎control large territories ample to sustain their people.” He also pointed out that Jewish ‎‎immigration to Palestine and Transjordan would not harm the Arabs since there was ‎‎plenty of room for everyone. Roosevelt then went on to propose transfer of Arabs, “Some ‎‎of the Arabs on poor land in Palestine could be given much better land in adjoining Arab ‎‎countries."

British Ambassador ‎‎Lindsay answered Roosevelt by saying that there was opposition in both the Arab and ‎‎Moslem world but the President “belittled this opposition and thought it due ‎largely to ‎British indecision and conflicting policy.”

Roosevelt had also thought of ideas of how to finance this transfer. He thought that “if a ‎plan was ‎devised for a settlement of 100,000 families costing $3,000 a family or ‎‎$300 million the ‎funds might be raised” by the American Government, the British and ‎French ‎Governments, and private subscriptions - largely Jewish; each of these bodies ‎would ‎contribute $100 million.‎‎

Towards the end of December the British Charge d'Affaires in Washington met with ‎‎Sumner Welles and handed him a memorandum on transfer received from the British ‎‎Government, adding that Roosevelt would probably be interested in it.‎‎ ‎After pointing out that the latest available evidence did not bear out the belief that any ‎‎considerable quantity of water could be obtained in Transjordan at shallow levels by ‎‎boring wells, the memorandum continued,

“Suggestions have also been ‎made that if the ‎free offer of cultivable land in Transjordan did not suffice to attract the ‎Arabs from ‎Palestine; they might be compelled to emigrate from it, with the object of ‎vacating land in ‎Palestine for settlement by Jews.”

Until the Wannssee conference of January 1942 there was still hope in Jewish / Zionistic ‎circles that the Nazis would allow mass Jewish immigration. With the inevitable invasion ‎of Poland by the Nazis in September 1939 the doors of Europe began to close and the fate ‎of European Jewry was sealed.

The British Government “Complicity” can be found in Whitehall’s fear of the repercussions in Britain, India and the ‎Moslem world if they should back Roosevelt's plan of Arab "resettlement". They saw the threat to the sources of raw materials and oil for the Empire ‎in agreeing to Roosevelt’s proposals. Their Empire would be in jeopardy due to their ‎promises made to the Jews.

Lancelot Oliphant of the British Foreign ‎‎Office brought, ‎in his words, the “fallacy” which Roosevelt was ‎using to try and solve the Palestine ‎problem in a reply sent to Lindsay saying that the British ‎government would not even ‎contemplate such an idea. That His Majesty's ‎Government would be ‎accused of such a thing. That it would be “thoroughly ‎unjust” to compel the "long-established community" the Arabs to ‎transfer from Palestine “to make room for immigrants ‎‎[Jews] of a totally different race ‎who have had no connection with [Palestine] for at ‎least 2,000 years.”

The British Government also felt that the ‎problem of ‎‎“redistribution of the Arab and Jewish communities in Palestine and across ‎the Jordan”, ‎was not one of finance but rather of politics.‎On two occasions, Roosevelt raised his plan with British representatives but he was ‎‎‎“firmly told that no amount of financial inducement would move the Palestinian ‎Arabs.” ‎Roosevelt however, was unconvinced by this British reply.

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Chaim ‎Weizmann had his first meeting with Roosevelt in February 1940. At this ‎meeting, Roosevelt put forward ‎the idea of bribing the Arabs, asking Weizmann “What ‎about the Arabs? Can't that be ‎settled with a little baksheesh?” Weizmann replied that “it ‎wasn't as simple as all that. Of ‎course the Jewish people would compensate the Arabs in a ‎reasonable way for anything they got, but ‎there were other factors appertaining to a ‎settlement.”‎

In December 1942 two and a half years later, Roosevelt told Treasury Secretary,

Henry ‎‎Morgenthau, “I actually would put a barbed wire around Palestine, and I would begin to ‎‎move the Arabs out of Palestine.... I would provide land for the Arabs in some other part ‎‎of the Middle East.... Each time we move out an Arab we would bring in another Jewish ‎‎family.... But I don't want to bring in more than they can economically support.... It ‎‎would be an independent nation just like any other nation.... Naturally, if there are 90 per ‎‎cent Jews, the Jews would dominate the government.... There are lots of places to which ‎‎you could move the Arabs. All you have to do is drill a well because there is a large ‎‎underground water supply, and we can move the Arabs to places where they can really ‎‎live.” ‎

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In October 1943, the question of “barbed-wire” around Palestine came up again in a ‎‎conversation between Roosevelt and Judge Samuel Rosenman, Justice of the New York‎‎Supreme Court and speechwriter and counselor to Roosevelt. Roosevelt had spoken of ‎‎the “possibility of settling the Palestine question by letting the Jews in to the limit that the ‎‎country will support them - "with a barbed-wire fence around the Holy Land.” Rosenman ‎‎thought that this would work but only “if the fence was a two-way one to keep the Jews in and the ‎‎Arabs out.”

What should be mentioned here is that Roosevelt already knew full ‎well of the extent Nazi program of mass genocide. He had been informed by Churchill in the ‎Casablanca Conference January 14 to 24, 1943, of the entire text of the Protocols of the ‎Wannssee conference gleaned from the transmission of the file through the Abwehr ‎G312 “Enigma” program at Bletchley Park. ‎Roosevelt had also read the Polish Foreign Minister Count Edward Raczynski's note which had been addressed to the Governments of the United Nations on 10 December 1942 entitled, "The mass extermination of Jews in German occupied Poland", which provided the Allies with the earliest and most accurate accounts of the Holocaust.

In addition to being informed by documents and Intelligence reports during the course of 1943 an officer in the Związek Walki Zbrojnej (abbreviation: ZWZ or Union of Armed Struggle) of the Polish underground, Jan Karski, traveled to Washington as an emissary of the Polish Resistance to meet with President Franklin Roosevelt and report directly to the President on the European conflict and specifically conditions in his own country, Poland.

In 1942 Karski was selected by Cyryl Ratajski, the Polish Government's Delegate at Home, to perform a secret mission to gather information about Nazi atrocities in occupied Poland. In order to gather evidence, Karski met Bund activist Leon Feiner and was twice smuggled by Jewish underground leaders into the Warsaw Ghetto for the purpose of showing him first hand what was happening to the Polish Jews. Karski had visited Bełżec death camp disguised as a Ukrainian camp guard and had gained first hand eyewitness to the extermination of the Jews of Europe. Karski reported to the Polish, British and U.S. governments in 1942 on the situation in Poland and especially on the the extermination of the Jews. He had done so by smuggling out a microfilm with further textual information in German as proof from the Underground Movement on the extermination of European Jews in occupied Poland.

Karski met with Polish politicians in exile including the Polish Prime Minister Władysław Sikorski , as well as members of political parties such as the PPS, SN, SP, SL, Jewish Bund and Poalei Zion. He also spoke to Anthony Eden, the British foreign secretary who reported the meeting directly to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, in a detailed statement on what Karski had seen in Warsaw and Bełżec. Karski then traveled to the United States to report to President Franklin D.Roosevelt. Roosevelt requested that Karski meet with Justice Frankfurter and Rabbi Stephen Wise, as it would be of vital concern for them to be apprised of the horrors befalling their fellow Jews in Poland. Frankfurter and Wise listened to Karski’s detailed eyewitness accounts from Belzec concentration camp of the program of extermination of the Jewish people carried out by the Nazis.

When Roosevelt, Frankfurter and Wise were told by Karski’s of the,“the unprecedented' extent of the genocide”, Felix Frankfurter stated that he was unable to "conceive the unconceivable" of the full extent of the methodical extermination of the Jewish people.

In April 1944 two prisoners, Rudolf Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, managed to escape from Auschwitz and the Polish Underground once more provided information that they gave to the Allies – together with intelligence gained from two other prisoners who escaped shortly afterwards. This information formed the basis on the workings of Auschwitz that became known as the “Auschwitz Protocols”. This was the first absolute and conclusive proof the Allies received that mass murder was taking place at Auschwitz.

Limited information about the camp had reached the West before this date, but the Auschwitz Protocols removed any reasonable doubt about the scale and nature of the crime, and the Western media were quick to report the news. On 18 June the BBC broadcast a radio story about Auschwitz, and on 20 June the New York Times carried a report which explicitly mentioned the ‘gas chambers’ at Auschwitz/Birkenau.

At the beginning of November 1944, Roosevelt was elected President for an ‎‎unprecedented fourth term. A few days later, Roosevelt discussed the Palestine situation ‎‎with the Under-Secretary of State, Edward Stettinius. Roosevelt had developed his ideas for the transfer of the Arabs from Palestine as time progressed as he heard from State Department ‎officials and Military Intelligence reports of the events happening in Eastern Europe‎against the Jews. ‎Some believe that Roosevelt's views had become more extreme in his criticism of British policy in Palestine, which was ruled by Whitehall’s pro-Arab Middle Eastern stance as Arab "complicity" with the Nazi regime became more apparent.

After telling Roosevelt of their ‎‎difficulties regarding Palestine, Under-Secretary of State, Edward Stettinius wrote in his diary, “He thinks Palestine‎‎should be for the Jews and no Arabs should be in it”. Roosevelt felt confident ‎‎that he would be able to “iron out” the whole Arab-Jewish issue. Originally recommending the transfer of two hundred thousand Arabs, Roosevelt eventually ‎‎stated unequivocally that “Palestine should be for the Jews and no Arabs should be in it.” ‎and that as stated in the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate that, "The Mandated area of Palestine should be exclusive Jewish territory.”‎‎ ‎

Almost all the statements that are quoted on this subject were not written by Roosevelt‎himself, but by the ‎various people he worked and met with. There are no recordings nor written notes ‎either. This however, is characteristic of Franklin D. ‎Roosevelt since he was a man who ‎always had one eye cocked on historians who would ‎someday assess his role in history. ‎He tried to cover his historical tracks, using ‎unrecorded telephone conversations and ‎unrecorded private interviews but we do have the recorded comments from those present with Roosevelt and their diary entries. ‎

Franklin D. Roosevelt died on the afternoon of April 12 at the Little White House at Warm Springs, Georgia and with his death so did his Plan for a Jewish Palestine with out the Arab "Problem". Once again the infamous historic statement “What If” resounds through history…